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When Attorney General Merrick Garland was asked at his confirmation hearings earlier this month what his priorities would be if confirmed, he responded immediately that it would be a vigorous pursuit of domestic terrorism. He did not say he would lead vigorous prosecutions, just vigorous pursuits.

This is dangerous business for the Department of Justice because it transforms its role from prosecuting crimes after they happen to predicting who would commit crimes that never happen.

How could the feds predict crimes? They would attempt to do so by a serious uptick in domestic surveillance of broad categories of people based on political and ideological views. The government loves to cast out fishing nets so to speak and then intimidate or prosecute whomever they bring in.

The National Security Agency Americas 60,000-person strong domestic spying apparatus already captures all data transmitted on fiber optic cable into, out of, and within the U.S.; thats every email, text and phone call. But they dont admit to this. When the FBI desperately sought to gain entry to the cellphones of two deceased mass murderers in San Bernardino, California, a few years ago, the NSA would not help them because doing so would acknowledge the NSAs mass warrantless spying.

Stymied by their own colleagues refusal to admit their unconstitutional behavior, but emboldened that the NSA could get away with this, federal agents either would break the law themselves by engaging in warrantless surveillance or obtain warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act court by claiming foreign terrorism as a pretext for domestic law enforcement surveillance.

Under the unconstitutional standards employed by the FISA court, if the feds present probable cause of an Americans communication with a foreign person, the FISA court would issue a search warrant for surveillance of all communications of the American.

This is unconstitutional because the standard for obtaining search warrants from a judge is articulated in the Fourth Amendment, which neither the Congress nor the courts can change. That standard is probable cause of crime is it more likely than not that the place to be searched contains evidence of crimes not probable cause of communication with a foreigner.

The former is a high standard intended to compel the courts, before issuing search warrants, to take account of the natural right to privacy, prevent government fishing expeditions and force the government to focus its law enforcement efforts on real, not imagined, crimes.

The FISA standard which morphed by a series of secret judicial opinions from probable cause of being a foreign agent to probable cause of communicating with a foreign agent to probable cause of communicating with a foreign person is far easier for federal agents to demonstrate than is probable cause of crime. It means that a call to my cousins in Florence is a sufficient basis for the feds to get a search warrant to legally surveil all of my communications telephone, texting and emails.

FBI and other federal agents know this. They know how easy it is to get a warrant from the FISA court. The most recent statistics revealed that it granted 99.96% of all surveillance applications.

When FBI agents go to the FISA court with probable cause of communication with a foreign person, but they are really looking for their targets domestic criminal communications, they have engaged in an act of corruption, deceived the court and cut holes in the Constitution they have sworn to uphold.

Once they have all of a persons communications, their plan is to find something that would constitute probable cause of crime or enable them to use fear of exposure to induce the person to work for them undercover.

If your neighbor tells you on the phone how happy he is in his anti-government group, and then someone in the group trespasses on government property and is arrested, expect a knock on your door from the feds who will demand to know what you knew and when you knew it. If the trespass is a felony, they will claim that they can prosecute you for your silence. This, too, is unconstitutional. Silence is protected by the First Amendment.

This is the danger of the Garland devotion to predicting who would commit crime; and it will get worse. Expect the next legislative step to be proposals that impose the legal obligation to report suspicious activities and the failure to do would be a crime. This would turn the U.S. into East Germany where thousands were prosecuted for failure to report their neighbors, friends and family; and thousands more suffered from prosecutions based on false reports.

The Fourth Amendment was written to prevent this. Under the Constitution, the government may not seek punishment for silence, surveil for beliefs or charge for crimes not committed. But if a wired undercover agent can get someone the government fears to inculpate himself with his words and then persuade that person to take a small step in furtherance of those words even if no actual crime is committed this is enough to charge conspiracy; the prosecutors favorite crime because it is the easiest to prove.

In the years following 9/11, hundreds of folks in America were set up by the feds and prosecuted and convicted for crimes that they never committed, but which they merely agreed to commit when persuaded by an undercover agent.

The government loves to give the impression that it has caught bad guys before they struck, thereby keeping us safe. Dont believe it. The governments first task is to keep us free. But when it violates the Constitution, it keeps us neither safe nor free. Who will keep us safe from the government?

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Napolitano: The coming war on privacy - Daily Herald

The US already has MDO in place. And India will be seeking its expertise in an effort to adopt the same system for its own forces.

When the visiting US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin meets his counterpart Rajnath Singh on Saturday, India will seek cooperation from the US in Multi Domain Operation (MD), and Intelligence Sharing.

On Friday late afternoon the US Defense Secretary arrived in India on Friday on a two day visit which is aimed at enhancing the bilateral defense and security ties between the two countries. He is accompanied by a high level official delegation. This is the first visit of one of the top officers from the Biden administration and assumes importance as it follows the recently concluded Quad Leaders Summit which was called by the US President Joe Biden

Since India is trying to transform from man-power intensive to technology-intensive force, talks with the US is going to be in Multi-Doman Operations (MDO). And also Artificial Intelligence, Quantum Computing, Big Data as well as block chain. The two are also going to talk about Intelligence sharing, as well as operationalizing agreements inked between the two countries, a senior officer confirmed to Financial Express Online, late Friday evening.

Though India has recently started focusing on jointness among all the three services this means that the all the services participate together, and need not necessarily be in an integrated manner.

MDO is a step beyond joint. Roughly it means that capabilities are employed through multiple domains. This is very critical in network centric warfare. And is already operational among the NATO members as well as countries like Australia has this in operation. Once this is operational then it is able to provide C4 [command, control, communication and computer] services which will help the forces to deploy the troops and assets in a very short time.

The US already has MDO in place. And India will be seeking its expertise in an effort to adopt the same system for its own forces. This means that right from the soldier on the ground will be able to enhance his individual performance which will be through AI support systems, machine learning, and biotechnical sensors.

India and the US will also talk about the operationalization of the agreements inked by both sides. As has been reported by Financial Express Online the two countries have concluded: The foundational agreement for mutual logistics support The Logistics Exchange Memorandum of Agreement (LEMOA); Communications Compatibility and Security Agreement (COMCASA). The COMCASA agreement facilitates encrypted communications between the two armed forces. Both countries have also concluded the Industrial Security Annex or ISA, which enables the US to share sensitive information with private Indian entities on military hardware and helped paving the way for joint production of military equipment. Last year, the two countries inked the long pending Basic Exchange and Cooperation Agreement (BECA).

Also read | India-US talks: Interoperability, CATSAA, Indo-Pacific Region and other issues to be the focus of talks with Lloyd Austin

Both the US Navy and the Indian Navy have signed a loan agreement and installed two Pacific fleet- provided CENTRIXS systems at the Indian Navy headquarters and the two sides are in discussions for installing several more at other locations. New Delhi, has according to reports also created a common account of USD 5 million, this has been set up to pay for services or information sought from the US under the COMCASA.

And to analyze large volumes of data that are received as part of Maritime Domain Awareness, a tactical data link, Sealink Advanced Analysis (S2A), is in the process of being set up. For the Big Data Analytics, the S2A is being co-developed by India and the US.

He reached New Delhi after concluding his visits to Japan and South Korea. And later in the evening called on National Security Advisor Ajit Doval. Several issues including the ongoing standoff between India and China along the Line of Actual Control (LAC), the situation in Myanmar as well as other issues of mutual interests were discussed.

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India-US talks: MDO, intelligence sharing, and operationalizing agreements to be discussed; Lloyd Austin calls on NSA Ajit Doval - The Financial...

In March of last year, Andrea Circle Bear was transferred from a South Dakota jail to FMC Carswell, an all-female prison for those with special medical needs in Fort Worth, Texas. Circle Bear, a member of the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe, was serving out a 26-month sentence for conducting a pair of drug deals totaling $850. She was also heavily pregnant. On March 31, Circle Bear began experiencing symptoms of COVID-19dry fever, heavy coughand was placed on a ventilator. The following day, she delivered her baby via C-section. Three days after that, she tested positive for COVID-19. She was dead three weeks later, the first federal prisoner to die of the coronavirus.

Around this time, another inmate at FMC Carswell, Reality Winner, requested compassionate release due to the rapid spread of COVID-19 among the prison population. Due to her history of respiratory illness and bulimia, the virus posed a heavy risk for the 28-year-old. But federal prosecutors blocked Winners request to commute the remaining 19 months of her sentence. Three months later, she contracted COVID-19. Of the 1,625 incarcerated women at FMC Carswell, over 500 came down with the coronavirus, the second most cases of any federal prison. Six of the women died.

She has been under tremendous pressure, says Sonia Kennebeck. She has also been sexually harassed, and a bunch of other things. Its completely inhumane and entirely disproportionate.

Kennebeck, a filmmaker and investigative journalist, has been documenting Winners case for the better part of three years, trailing her family members and friends, filing FOIA requests, and conducting a phone interview with the whistleblower from prison. The result is The United States vs. Reality Winner, a documentary feature making its (virtual) premiere at SXSW.

Reality Winners case is a complicated one, to say the least. She was given her nameand that is her real, government nameby her father after hed observed a woman in Lamaze class with a T-shirt that read I COACHED A REAL WINNER. He wanted her to succeed, and she in turn worshipped him. The Sept. 11 attacks had a profound effect on her father, who instilled in 9-year-old Winner the curiosity to learn what happened, and why. In addition to her academic prowess, Winner had an innate desire to help others, donating to volunteer groups, rescuing cats and dogs, and pushing wheelchair-bound kids in half-marathons as part of Athletes Serving Athletes. She served as an Air Force cryptolinguist from 2010 to 2016, translating communications that would inform drone operators whom they should target. When she was honorably discharged in October 2016, she received a commendation stating she was responsible for removing more than 100 enemies from the battlefield.

One month later, she moved to Augusta, Georgia, in search of work at an NGO. She was a bit disenchanted by her work in the drone program, and felt shed lost sight of the reason she joined the military in the first placeto help others. She taught at a yoga studio and CrossFit gym, and, despite being fluent in Persian, Pashto, and Dari, couldnt seem to find work at a nonprofit due to her lack of a college degree. Then her father passed away. In February 2017, she landed a job at Pluribus International Corporation, an NSA contractor, translating documents related to Irans aerospace program.

But Winner, a Libertarian-minded Texan armed with a bright-pink AR-15, soon became disgusted with President Trump. Following his Muslim ban, she tweeted, the most dangerous entry to this country was the orange fascist we let into the white house. And as the chatter began heating up about possible Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, Winner was puzzled. She had top-secret clearance and had seen with her own two eyes documented evidence that Russia had conducted an elaborate cyberattack on a key U.S. voting software supplier, thereby accessing voter rolls, and sent a series of spear-phishing emails to over 100 election officials just prior to the election. Why was the U.S. government suppressing this information?

On May 9, 2017, the day President Trump fired FBI Director James Comeywho was heading an investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 electionWinner printed out a document from her computer, folded it up, stuffed it in her pantyhose, and left the building. She then sent a copy of the document via snail mail to The Intercepts New York office. Then, The Interceptthinking the document was perhaps fakedid something highly unusual. As New York Magazine reported:

On May 30, according to court filings, an unnamed reporter sent pictures of the document to a contractor for the U.S. government and told the contractor that theyd been postmarked in Augusta. The contractor initially said that the documents were fake but, after checking with someone at the NSA, reported that they were real.

A journalist sending copies of a leaked U.S. government document back to the U.S. government is almost unheard of.

A journalist sending copies of a leaked U.S. government document back to the U.S. government is almost unheard of. The copies of the document sent by The Intercept reporter eventually made it to the NSA and then the FBI, and the move ended up giving Winner away to the authorities. According to The Guardian:

A visible crease in the document told officials that the Intercept must have received a hard copy in the mail, according to prosecutors Information security analysts also pointed out that the printout handed to the NSA by the Intercept appeared to feature a unique microdot pattern, a security feature intended to allow the documents owner to keep track of precisely when and where it was printed. Investigators reviewed a log of who had printed the file. Six names, including Winners, showed up. A search of Winners computer system also allegedly turned up two emails that she had previously sent to the Intercept from her personal account about a podcast published by the site. Investigators had their target.

On June 3, 2017, 11 mostly armed federal agents descended on Winners home and, without reading her Miranda rights, interrogated her for over an hour in a back room, eventually coaxing a confession out of her.

While a transcript of the FBI interrogation of Winner has leaked, forming the basis for the stage play Is This a Room, the audio of the strange encounter had never seen the light of day. So, Kennebeck filed a FOIA request for the audio two years ago. After the FBI denied the request, she appealed the decision to Trumps Department of Justice, which sided with the filmmaker. And the FBI still didnt release the material, so we sued themmy small production company, with some pro bono help from the Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press, says Kennebeck.

She kept on editing The United States vs. Reality Winner and locked the picture in early February, including voiceover work from Stranger Things star Natalia Dyer as Winner. Then, on Feb. 10, she learned that theyd won their suit and would be receiving the audio of the grilling. It was quite dramatic, recalls Kennebeck. When we actually won the court order, it was the same day that the SXSW world premiere was announced, so we had already finished the film and recorded the voiceovers with Natalia Dyer, and we just reopened the entire film.

The audio of the interrogation reveals how the FBI agents engaged Winner in a bizarre, entrapment-y talk (their words), repeatedly insisting that she was there voluntarilyeven though the armed agents had cornered her in a tiny room with no windowand vacillating between jokey and threatening.

All the while, Winner was absolutely terrified. I couldnt hold it anymore, but at the same time I was like, if I take one step out of line theyre gonna think oh, well, lets put her down, she tells Kennebeck during a prison interview in the film. Or if my cat tried to get out or if she got scared, I dont know what I was going to do if something was going to happen to her. So, I was afraid that my reaction would warrant lethal force I was really afraid to even put one foot out of line.

On June 5, two days after she was arrested, The Intercept released their story with the headline, TOP-SECRET NSA REPORT DETAILS RUSSIAN HACKING EFFORT DAYS BEFORE 2016 ELECTION. There were four authors bylined on the piece: Matthew Cole, Richard Esposito, Sam Biddle, and Ryan Grim. Sources tell The Daily Beast that Biddle and Grim were not heavily involved in the reporting process, which fell on the shoulders of Cole and Esposito. In The United States vs. Reality Winner, a pair of fellow whistleblowers raise questions about the conduct of Cole and Esposito, the latter of whom left journalism after the publication of the Winner story to work in the communications department of the NYPD, in essence working for the state after revealing a source to the state. Perhaps even more egregious than the microdots oversight was the decision to supply a government contractor with where the Winner missive came from.

Not only did they give them the content, they gave them the envelope information and where it came from. What the heck? NSA whistleblower Thomas Drake says in the film. The last thing youre going to do is take a disclosure and take the raw version of it and give it to the government for review. Unfortunately, and I have to say this now, it begs some really uncomfortable questions about what was the intent of The Intercept reporters of record? What did they actually share, or what didnt they protect?

Those same two journalists got me arrested, and because of their carelessnesssubterfuge might be a better wordI spent two years in prison.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange called the journalist who sent a copy of the document to the federal governmentwho is either Cole or Espositoa menace to sources, and offered a $10,000 reward for information leading to the public exposure & termination of the reporter. John Kiriakou, a CIA whistleblower who disclosed information on torture, also points the finger squarely at Cole and Esposito in the film: Those same two journalists got me arrested, and because of their carelessnesssubterfuge might be a better wordI spent two years in prison.

Neither Cole nor Esposito responded to requests for comment; a spokesperson for The Intercept issued a statement to The Daily Beast that read, in part: We have acknowledged our mistakes, and we made changes to our editorial process after a comprehensive internal review. As other journalists have noted, our errors were not singularly responsible for her arrest, but our organization supported her legal defense and we have continued to cover her ordeal while other media outlets moved on.

The Intercept gave Kennebeck access to their newsroom for the documentary, and both editor-in-chief Betsy Reed and national security reporter James Risen are featured. While Kennebeck is thankful for their participation, including what she characterizes as a very tense interview with Reed, as a journalist whos reported on national security and who gives source-protection workshops, shes highly critical of their methods with the Winner story. I would have loved to talk to these journalists personally, she says. I even spoke to a third person who says he was revealed as a source, who worked with one of them. Now, do humans make mistakes? Yes, they do. Should they be in this job if they make them repeatedly?

Reality Winner pleaded not guilty to the charge of willful retention and transmission of national defense information, and was repeatedly denied bail by the judge. During pre-trial hearings, the government tried to smear her as someone who hates America, pointing to a clearly sarcastic Facebook exchange shed made with her sister Brittany about hating America, and a diary entry where she joked about burning down the White House. But Winner did not hate America; on the contrary, she cared deeply about it, having not only served her country but taken active steps to improve it, including meeting with her state senator to discuss the effects of climate change.

They made her sound so devious and evil, Realitys mother, Billie Winner-Davis, says in the film. Thats probably the reason why [her stepfather] and I decided that we had to speak out.

Winner eventually accepted a plea deal of five years and three months behind bars for violating the Espionage Act. Once the sentence was passed down, Kennebeck repeatedly requested to interview Winner; each request was denied.

Though Winners family and friends have made appeals to the Trump and Biden administrations, their pleas have fallen on deaf ears. Winner is expected to be released on Nov. 23, 2021, though she is still struggling from the aftermath of COVID. To make matters worse, in February, winter storm Uri knocked out power at FMC Carswell, leaving inmatesmany of whom had COVID-19without heat and hot water. Were in a cinder block building with no insulation, an inmate told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. We have to go outside to get our meals, and its snow and icy everywhere and were freezing.

Winner is the eighth whistleblower to be charged under the Espionage Act, which dates back to 1917, and received the longest sentence ever imposed in federal court for leaking government documents to the press. And the question remains: Who was harmed by Winners disclosure?

Because it was so important to the integrity of our elections, and our whole election system and our democracy, aka what our country built on, you would think somebody who blew the whistle to expose the damage that a foreign adversarial nation did to us, you would think shed be released, Realitys sister Brittany says in the film. Youd think that they would actually probably say thank you for the information she made available for, really, the people who needed to know it.

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How America Betrayed Reality Winner THE DAILY BEAST - The Daily Beast

Police Deliver Stern Warning to 82-Year-Old Grandmother Over Afternoon Tea Party With Neighbour.

Police in the UK delivered a stern warning to an 82-year-old grandmother after she had a socially distanced cup of tea with her neighbours in their communal garden. Officers arrived at the 82-year-olds sheltered housing complex home at 9.45 pm to question her about the incident just after she had settled into bed to watch television.

They told the pensioner she had been reported for drinking tea outside with her neighbours, in breach of coronaviruslockdown restrictions.

Her daughter, Lesley Magovern, 56, expressed her disgust over the action police took and could not believe police travelled from Gloucester to Charlton Kings so late for something so ridiculous.

She added, My son works for the London Met and even he could not believe what I was telling him. We all have been left thinking, what a waste of police resources.

Mrs Magovern who has declined to name her mother to protect her from repercussions said she had had a socially distanced cup of tea with three other residents from her complex in Charlton Kings, Gloucestershire, at 1.30 pm on March 9. She added:

My mother heard a knock at the door and it was very late and she wondered really who it could be. My mother is quite deaf and she asked who it was and she thought the voice said Its me. Then mother assumed it was in fact me and she then opened the door.

There were two officers stood there, a man and a woman with masks on and they asked if they could come in and speak to her. They did not show her any identification so she just trusted the uniform and she was quite frightened. My mother has never been in trouble with the police in her life.

When they were there, they told my mother if it were to happen again she would be fined. Then they asked her to provide identification so she was rooting around trying to find some. Finally, she ended up showing them an out-of-date driving licence as that is all she had.

In a statement, a Gloucestershire Police spokesman said: An officer has spoken to the complainant and an explanation was provided in response to concerns raised. She was content with this and the matter has been resolved.

Police received a report of a potential Covid breach on Tuesday 9 March at 1.30 pm suspecting that there was a gathering involving people from multiple households in a residential garden in Charlton Kings, Cheltenham. Covid response officers attended later that day at around 9.45 pm where some residents were spoken to and given words of advice around current restrictions.

Officers are deployed to incidents based on an assessment of the threat, risk and harm of the incident and in this case officers who are part of the Covid response team and are deployed across the county attended later that evening.

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Police Deliver Stern Warning to 82-Year-Old Grandmother Over Afternoon Tea Party With NeighbourNeighbour - Euro Weekly News

Passed only by a single vote in the Senate, President Joe Bidens $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act may lay the basis for overcoming two deep-seated problems that have bedeviled the Democratic Party for decades.

The first is a half-century curse on Democrats ability to maintain unified control of the federal government. As I wrote in a Washington Post op-ed a year ago:

Since 1968, Democrats have controlled both Congress and the White House three times, and each one of those periods ended with a hard turn right. Altogether, the years of unified Democratic government add up to just eight out of the past 52: four when Jimmy Carter was president, and the first two years of Bill Clintons and Barack Obamas first terms. Carters presidency ended with Ronald Reagans election in 1980, Clintons first years with Newt Gingrichs Republican Revolution in 1994, and Obamas first years with the tea party insurgency in 2010.

Even before the pandemic, it was clear that if Democrats won control of both Congress and the presidency, they needed to prioritize early deliverables to the votersvisible material benefitsto avoid repeating the disastrous reversals in midterm elections the party suffered under Clinton in 1994 and Obama in 2010. The pandemic has made those early deliverables only more urgent, and the big relief bill is providing them. With their narrow majorities in both houses of Congress, Democrats will need all the help they can get to retain control.

But short-term measures ought to support a long-term vision, and the relief legislation does that too. Indeed, it advances a second goal that has eluded Democrats for a long time: rebuilding a bottom-up political majority, encompassing both low-income working people and the middle class.

One of the reasons that Clinton and Obama devoted their first two years in office to universal health coverage was its potential for promoting that kind of cross-class support. Universal coverage would help both the uninsured poor and many in the middle class denied protection for pre-existing conditions and facing unaffordable health costs. But although Obama succeeded where Clinton failed, the Affordable Care Act was slow in delivering benefits, and its limitations still prevent it from enjoying the broad cross-class support that Medicare enjoys.

More from Paul Starr

The Biden relief legislation has two key elements, improvements to ACA subsidies and child care tax credits, that extend benefits from the poor into the middle class. Both thereby try to avoid the political weaknesses of programs solely identified with the poor. But both have been enacted on only a temporary basis, and with no votes to spare in the Senate it will be an enormous challenge to make them permanent in a follow-up reconciliation bill before the 2022 election.

Under the ACA, people who enroll for coverage through the insurance marketplaces are eligible for premium subsidies on a sliding-scale basis. Until now, however, the law has cut off subsidies entirely at 400 percent of the federal poverty level ($51,040 for a single person). That cutoff point, or subsidy cliff, may seem reasonable enough, but many people with incomes just above that level face extremely high costs. For example, as Katie Keith points out at Health Affairs, a 60-year-old earning just over the 400 percent cutoff faces an average annual premium of $12,886, or about 25.8 percent of income, not counting out-of-pocket health costs, which may also be substantial. Consequently, many middle-class people dont see the ACA as offering them much financial protection.

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The Biden rescue plan, as Jon Walker has argued, finally attempts to make good on the promise of affordable insurance. For 2021 and 2022, it extends subsidies to people above the cutoff, limiting their premiums to 8.5 percent of income. It also increases subsidies at lower incomes; in fact, people with incomes between 100 and 150 percent of the poverty leveland anyone who received unemployment benefits during 2021will be eligible for a silver plan on the marketplace at no premium.

The expanded child tax credits are potentially even more significant as a cross-class measure than the improved health insurance subsidies. Most of the news coverage about the child tax credits has focused on the stunning point that they will cut child poverty nearly in half. But this may obscure the politically crucial fact that the child tax credits are not an anti-poverty program in the sense of being targeted exclusively, or even primarily, to the poor.

Like the expanded ACA subsidies, the relief plans child tax credits have cross-class benefits. The full credit$3,600 per child under age 6, and $3,000 per child from ages 7 to 17will begin to phase out only at incomes well into the middle class ($112,500 for single heads of household; $150,000 for married couples). Even with incomes up to $400,000, couples with children will get partial credits. Many low-income families who do not receive the existing $2,000-per-child credit because their earnings are too low will also benefit from the legislation because it makes the enlarged credit fully refundable, which means that even those without tax liability will be able to receive the credit.

Not only do the child tax credits have potential cross-class support; they also have potential cross-party support because many conservatives see them as a pro-family policy.

The child tax credits are effectively what other countries call family allowances. Some analyses have suggested that in supporting the tax credits, Democrats are reversing the position they took during the 1990s in seeking to end welfare as we know it. Thats true in one sense: The new benefits are not work-related. But, in another sense, the child tax credits are the fulfillment of the promise to end welfare as we know it. Like family allowances elsewhere, the Biden tax credits dont phase out when low-income parents take paying jobs, so they dont have the kind of work disincentive effect that means-tested welfare assistance has had.

Not only do the child tax credits have potential cross-class support; they also have potential cross-party support because many conservatives see them as a pro-family policyindeed, as a policy that supports more traditional families where the mother stays home with young children. The tax credits thereby avoid some of the ideological divisions that have erupted over public subsidies for child care ever since Richard Nixon vetoed child care legislation in 1971.

Nonetheless, the opposition to making the expanded ACA subsidies and child tax credits permanent will be intense. The opponents will claim that making middle-class people eligible for benefits is costly and unnecessary. They will cite data showing that the programs will be more progressive in the strict sense of directing benefits more to the poor if eligibility ends at low incomes. But by limiting benefits to the poor, the opponents will be inviting a return to all the old political and incentive problems of welfare.

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Can Democrats succeed in turning these temporary policies into a new foundation for social provision in the United States? For the immediate future, the answer will depend on the Democrats precarious majority in the Senate. In a New York Times op-ed the other day, law professor Paul Campos urged Justice Stephen Breyer to retire immediately because the death or incapacitation of a single Democratic senator over the next 22 months could return Mitch McConnell to the position of majority leader, once again able to obstruct a Democratic Supreme Court nominee. Campos pointed out that six Democratic senators over age 70 represent states with Republican governors who could replace them with a Republican; five Democrats represent states where vacancies would go unfilled for months until an election. A single loss in one of these states would also likely end hopes for progressive reform in this Congress, including the extension of the ACA subsidies and child tax credits.

With their tenuous Senate majority, Democrats ought to be in a hurry to do whatever they can on infrastructure, taxes, and other issues. They have already made the most out of the leastthe most substantial relief measure conceivable with the thinnest possible Senate majority. If they can turn that relief measure into a permanent transformation of social policy, it will be one of the most brilliant acts of liberal political magic we have seen in a very long time.

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The Precarious Greatness of the Biden Strategy - The American Prospect